You've gotta a friend.... or do you?

By Carol Bondy
This week I received a Facebook Friend request from an Emily Smith. I didn't recognize the name but I did recognize some of her friends.  What I also noticed was that Emily, other than describing herself as an "Abiquiu Fan", shared no personal information.  She reposted local posts but there were no personal posts.   There were no images of Emily.  Since that time "Emily" has changed her last name from Smith to Sheppard and continues to make friend requests to locals.   Neither an Emily Smith or an Emily Sheppard is a subscriber to the Abiquiu News.

​As I said, I did recognize some of her friends.  Facebook will show you mutual friends when you get a friend request.  I contacted them and all but one responded that while they did accept "Emily's" friend request they did not know her.  In some cases they saw mutual friends and thought she must be ok.  I've since heard from others that they received a request from this account but didn't know her and didn't accept the friend request.

What's the endgame?  It could be malicious.  It  could be someone just wanting to troll for information.  Worse case scenario is that it is a scammer. Scammers create fake Facebook profiles and request to be your friend to gain access to personal information that you restrict to "friends only." This information may include your contact information for spamming or other personal information that might be useful in setting you up for a phishing attack.  

When you accept these type of friend requests you are putting both your information and your friends' information at risk.

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​Product Recommendation of the Week - Blink XT Home Security Camera System with Motion Detection, Wall Mount, HD Video, 2-Year Battery Life and Cloud Storage Included - 1 Camera Kit

Periodically Abiquiu Computers recommends products.  We recommend products that we have personally used or researched.  What is new is that we are an Amazon affiliate and if you purchase any of these products through our link we receive a small commission from Amazon.

Carol came across this during Amazon's Holiday Savings.   So far we have some great shots of our dogs and the UPS driver! This is easy to install.   We purchased the weatherproof one pictured below.  Alerts are sent to your phone or you can just check in.  Some of our kids were out here and they had one in their apartment that they used to check on their kitties.

Blink

• WEATHERPROOF FOR OUTDOOR OR INDOOR USE: Place and move your wireless Blink camera anywhere around your home both inside and out. Start off with a small system and expand to up to 10 cameras on one Blink Sync Module
• MOTION DETECTOR: Built-in motion sensor alarm, when motion detector is triggered, Wi-Fi cameras will send an alert to your smartphone and record a short clip of the event to the cloud
• BATTERY POWERED SECURITY SYSTEM: Wireless home camera with 2-year battery life, powered by 2 AA Lithium batteries (included), data is sent from IP cameras over Wi-Fi
• SMART HOME VIDEO SECURITY WITH HD VIDEO: Simple self-install home monitoring in minutes; easy to control wireless cameras with the free Blink Home Monitor iOS or Android app (Requires iOS 10.3 or Android 5 Lollipop or higher)
• FREE CLOUD STORAGE: Totally wire-free, with no monthly fees or service contract required

Click link below for more information or to purchase.